Fifteen Dollars
by nine miles to go
Summary: . . . and fifty seven cents. It's funny what a kid remembers when his world is falling apart. Kenny centric.
1. Chapter One

Disclaimer: I don't own anything South Park related. So there.

Chapter One

* * *

_"Orange?" his mother had asked disapprovingly._

_Five-year-old Kenny nodded vigorously, his eyes lit with excitement. "Orange," he affirmed, his voice squeaking happily. This coat would be the first one of his very own. No longer would he wear the old one of Kevin's or his father's. _

_"You better make sure you like that coat," his mother warned him, "because it's the last one you'll get in a long time." _

_There was a weariness in her voice that Kenny was too young to understand. He stroked the inside of the flannel lining lovingly--it didn't matter that it was summer and ninety degrees in South Park. The coat was perfect in every way. Just touching it made him want to chant Mine, mine, mine! No one else's. His very own. _

_His mother reached for the jacket to hand it to the saleslady. Kenny watched eagerly as it was rung up, hoping with all his might that the woman would not hand his mother back the plastic card and shake her head like that last mean one had at the grocery store._

_"Your total is fifteen dollars and fifty seven cents." _

_Kenny would remember those numbers his whole life. Chant them when he was afraid, when he was lonely, when he was bored. Emotions that he all too frequently felt in full force. _

_The holy coat was returned to him. _

_"If you lose this then you can freeze, for all I care. So you'd better keep track of it." _

_"I'll never let it out of my sight," Kenny vowed as they exited the shop. His mother wasn't listening, though, and had already moved on to the next shop. It was the end-of-summer sale event at the mall, and odds and ends were going drastically cheap. _

_Kenny snuggled the coat, running to catch up with her. Then the gunshot went off--his head splintered in agony--and he fell to the floor, dead._

* * *

Kenny woke with a start, a frown nettled on his face. "Wha . . . oh." That's right. Cartman provoked a zoo animal and it had torn him to shreds. Not one of his favorite deaths, but at least he hadn't gone to hell this time. Or heaven, for that matter. He'd just sort of floated in himself, which was more like sleeping than anything. Sometimes he even had dreams.

Like just now. Kenny sighed, rolling over to check the time on his alarm clock. Five-thirty--perfect. The bus was coming in exactly an hour and he had plenty of time to wait for his ears to stop ringing, which seemed to be a side effect of death.

His cherished coat was already on, hood drawn up and all, so he didn't have to worry about dressing. It was convenient that he always came back to life in whatever he'd been wearing when the initial dying occured. Not that he would be wearing anything else, because it was the coat or bust these days.

Out of habit he checked the carpet before he got out of bed. Not that he expected anything to be down there, but he had an odd paranoia of checking corners and cracks for anything that might be life-threatening.

It seemed to be clear, though, and Kenny stepped out of bed, tentatively scanning the room. Cartman accused Kenny of being careless, claiming that Kenny was "asking for it" like all the other people who were stupid enough to be poor. On the contrary Kenny was all too aware of everything going on around him, to the point where his eyes would strain from inside his head, bloodshot and splitting. His only fault was his lack of peripheral vision, but he would never pull down his hood for that. The occasional death it caused was worth the coverage.

And besides, if God or Satan or whoever the hell was shitting around with his life didn't get him in one accident, surely they'd set up another just to settle the score.

* * *

Kenny lived in a completely different neighborhood than Cartman, Stan, and Kyle, but Stan and Cartman still rode the same bus to South Park High. Kenny was asleep when the two of them boarded, but Cartman's loud, "Bet he slept on the bus all night, stupid bum-ass" effectively woke him.

"Shut up, Cartman," Stan muttered, sitting next to Kenny. Cartman sat behind them, at sixteen years old easily large enough to fill an entire bus seat. This morning the heavy teen did not retaliate to Stan's comment, as he he had jacked up the volume on his iPod and was watching something on it fervently.

"Probably some Nazi footage," Stan snorted, rolling his eyes.

Kenny smiled. He liked waking to Stan in the morning--of all of his friends, he liked Stan the best. Maybe a little bit more than that.

Stan looked over at Kenny somewhat guiltily. "Hey, are you alright?"

"Huh?"

"Oh, I mean . . . after Cartman unleashed that cheetah--"

"I'm fine," said Kenny, supressing a laugh. Leave it to Stan to give a shit about what happened to him. Kenny's face felt hot. Even back when they were kids Stan had cared more than the others, and Kenny was afraid that he was starting to read too much into it. He found himself wishing Stan would also care about him differently--not just as a friend, not just because he died again, but . . . Kenny shook his head, feeling stupid.

Stan nodded. "Hey, how'd your English paper come along?"

Kenny winced. He hadn't printed it out at the library. "Well enough," he lied, shrugging. If he was lucky he would get off the bus and a pack of rabid woodpeckers would off him, adequately giving him an excused absence for the day, but he glumly knew in his heart that his deaths were never quite so nicely-timed.

"I ran out of black and blue ink after my sister used it all up." Stan irritatedly retrieved his purple-inked paper and showed it to Kenny. "I don't think Mr. G's gonna appreciate this very much."

Kenny laughed into his hood. "It suits you," he said.

"Aw, screw off," Stan said good-naturedly.

Wendy boarded the bus just then, sitting in front of them. In the years that had passed Wendy had grown into a picture-perfect young lady, a classic beauty that was not only kind, but smart and opinionated, too. She listened like she wanted to hear what was being said. She laughed appreciatively at even the lamest jokes, and had joined every honors society and volunteer group South Park had to offer. All around she was every guy's dream.

It made Kenny want to throw up. And not in the oh-my-god-I-can't-talk-to-a-pretty-girl sort of way. More in the ew-stop-flirting-with-Stan-all-the-time-you-whore fashion.

"Good morning, Stan." Wendy smiled brilliantly so all of her perfect teeth shined. Self-consciously Kenny closed his mouth, remembering that his bottom teeth were crooked--not that anyone could see them from underneath the hood, but still. For good measure she added, "Hey, Kenny."

"Morning, Wendy." By this time Stan was not so nervous that he threw up on her, and to some degree Kenny was proud of him for it, although it still sickened him that his puppy-love for Wendy was just as raw as ever. Stan was perfectly able to hold a conversation with the girl now, without any embarassing bodily functions added to it.

"Can you help me with math?" she asked Stan, pursing her glossy lips.

Kenny rolled her eyes. Wendy didn't need help with math, and even if she did, Stan was not the person to get it from. Kyle was the one with the 4.1 GPA (proving that such a disgusting feat was, in fact, possible).

"Uh . . . y-yeah?" Stan agreed, looking confused. "But I'm not the best math student in the world, so maybe you should find someone else."

Kenny raised an eyebrow. Stan, passing up an opportunity to ogle into Wendy's beautiful eyes? Something wasn't right here. But he shouldn't get too hopeful.

Wendy looked disappointed. "Well, if you change your mind, give me a ring."

Stan nodded. Kenny sighed and stared at the window, watching the monotonous snowy lawns pass by and wondering vaguely when his next death would be.

* * *

"You're failing this class."

Kenny didn't look up at the teacher, but fiddled with his pencil instead. Well, the pencil he picked up off the floor and decided to use, that is.

"Mr. McCormick, are you listening?" Mrs. Haggarthy demanded.

"Hmmm."

"Take off that ridiculous coat, I can barely hear you."

"I'm cold."

"I can't understand you."

"Jerkwad," Kenny muttered, testing her. If he had known for certain she couldn't hear, he would have gone with something more appropriate like "bitch" or "asshole."

"_What_ did you just say?" Her voice was raised another octave, indignant.

Kenny smirked. "You can hear me just fine."

"Don't get smart with me, McCormick," she snapped. "I'm trying to help you. If you ever plan on graduating you had better shape up, or you'll end up repeating eleventh grade history."

The same way he was failing gym? Like it even mattered. Kenny wasn't even sure he cared about the future. It had never really occured to him, as he was constantly distracted by the whole dying thing most of the time, and when he wasn't dead he was usually involved in some sort of failed antics with his friends.

Mrs. Haggarthy's voice softened. "Look. I think you may have potential, McCormick, and I'm willing to give you a second chance. You did brilliantly first and second quarter, and I hate to see a good mind wasted."

Admittedly Kenny had tried in the first half of the year. But then his mom's new boyfriend had moved in to their house, which also contained Kenny's textbooks. And Kenny avoided entering the house whenever he could these days, so very little studying went on.

She paused. "I understand that sometimes difficulties at home--"

Kenny rose to his feet, cutting her off. "Don't even," he warned her.

"Calm down," she barked in a voice so commanding that he immediately resumed sitting.

"I just don't care about history," Kenny said stubbornly. Lies, lies, lies. History wasn't all that bad. He liked it better than his own, at least. People in history only died once.

The teacher's jaw stiffened. "I don't believe that, McCormick. Which is why I'm going to offer you a deal."

Kenny looked up at her suspiciously. "A deal?"

She nodded. "If you hand me a personal essay of 5,000 words explaining how history affects you by the end of this month, then I will raise your grade to a C for the quarter."

He hesitated a moment. She was offering him charity, and there was nothing in the world he hated more. Except dying, maybe. But Kenny knew that if there was any chance of escaping his shithole of a life, it would be leaving South Park. And he'd have to get into college with a scholarship to do that.

"Does it have to be typed?" he asked, feeling stupid. "I mean . . . can it be hand-written?" There was no guarantee that the library computers would always be functioning, or that his documents wouldn't be erased. It was better to have a safer plan.

"If you want to count the words by hand, then go for it," Mrs. Haggarthy said, shrugging. "So you accept the challenge?"

Kenny had a feeling he was going to regret this. "Yes."

* * *

_History effects me _

Kenny frowned, scratching it out.

_History affects me . . . _

"Aw, sc-screw it," he muttered, slamming the notebook shut. It was freezing outside, where he was perched at the rundown park a few blocks from his house. Maybe he would start it tomorrow, when it wasn't so cold. For now he would do his best to warm up by walking as far away from his neighborhood as he could.


	2. Chapter Two

Chapter Two

_"Kenny . . . oh, god . . . "_

_He could hear his mother's voice, but she sounded oddly far away. Kenny wondered vaguely where his coat was. Could he get in trouble for losing it after he was shot? That just seemed unfair. _

_"I never would have taken him if I'd known this would happen. Oh, god."_

_Then it occurred to him, the shock jolting him all the way to his fingers and toes: he had been _shot_. Some man in the mall had just killed him. Suddenly Kenny was furious. His mom had promised to take him out for pizza after they had shopped, and now he wasn't going to get any. He was dead and it was dark all around and he couldn't find his stupid new coat and his mom was going to just kill him for it and--_

_Kenny stifled a giggle. _

_"K-Kenny?" _

_Understandably Kenny was every bit as much surprised as his mother when his eyes opened to the sight of a bare hospital room. _

_"Hi," he said groggily, sitting up. Then he touched a hand to his head. "I have a headache. Where are we?" _

_His mother was too flabbergasted to speak. There were tear tracks running down her cheeks and her eyes were wide open in disbelief. "We're at the hospital, honey," she said faintly. _

_"Why? Because I was shot?" _

_She nodded, and her face erupted into a smile. "You're alive," she cried, embracing him. Kenny stiffened on impact. His mother had never hugged him quite like that before--as if she was squeezing him so hard that he could never go away. _

_"Yeah . . . " he said tentatively. _

_There were voices down the hall. "Oh, shit." His mother stood up quickly. "They're going to come for you. They think . . ." _

They think I'm dead_, Kenny realized, his throat growing tight._

_"Take mommy's hand and be a good boy. Quiet like a bunny." _

_"Do I still get pizza?" Kenny whined. He'd waited since April for pizza. _

_"Only if you pretend this never happened."_

* * *

It was freezing when Kenny woke up at Stark's Pond.

"Damn it," he muttered to himself. He'd meant to crash at Stan's or Cartman's (his mom was nice even if he was a total dick) but he must have gotten sat down on his walk and fallen asleep. He frowned--that seemed unlike him. More likely he'd been killed again and ended up here instead of a more convenient place, like school, where he wouldn't have to bother taking the bus at least.

He checked the watch Kyle had given him for his birthday. "6:03," he read to himself. It would probably be faster if he just walked. Thankfully most of the snow seemed to have melted into slush over night, so the chance of him slipping into the road, busting his head and getting hit by an SUV were at least slightly lessened.

When he stood he felt his ears ringing. Yes, he must have died last night again. Funny that he didn't end up going to heaven or hell like he usually did, but perhaps this death had been briefer.

Then again, he could never be certain of the logistics. Since the first time he had been killed, when he was five years old, he had known there was something wrong with him, even without people telling him so. After that he'd noticed the peculiar number of life-threatening situations he'd end up in and started wondering if there was a pattern involved. The first time he had been shot, for example, he'd gone to heaven. Naively he assumed that being shot sent him to heaven, whereas something like falling off a ledge down the stairs at the community pool would send him to hell (his second death, coincidentally). When his third death, a kitchen fire, had sent him to heaven again, he had speculated that perhaps the destination was switched back and forth evenly. But that theory was also disproved, and even now Kenny couldn't predict where he would end up after he died, just as he couldn't predict what was going to kill him next.

He tightened his hood against the cold, shivering slightly. It didn't matter anyway.

* * *

"Stan said you missed the bus."

Physics. Kenny's least favorite class so far in his high school career, as studying falling objects and horizontally launched projectiles seemed too ironically correlated with his own unfortunate mishaps.

He shrugged at Kyle. "Eh. Say, you know anything about this problem?"

Kyle leaned over, looking exasperated upon seeing that it was problem number one. "Yes. You have to find the acceleration first, and just plug it into force equals mass times . . ."

Kenny's thoughts fazed out as the door opened and Stan entered the room. His face felt hot immediately, and he stared down at his torn old shoes, embarassed. Then he snapped his gaze back up again. Damn it, Stan was his friend. Why the hell was he all worked up about looking dumb in front of him?

"Hey," said Kyle easily, waving him over.

Stan shook his head. "Can't stay long. I'm running errands for the office ladies." Stan had dropped a difficult course earlier in the year and decided to be an office assistant for the school during his spare period, since they didn't have a study hall. It was commonplace to see him walking around during sixth period when everyone else was in class.

"Who's the note for?" Kenny asked, seeing the slip in Stan's hand.

"Umm." Stan squinted at it. "Butters, your mom dropped your lunch off for you in the office."

"Yay!" Butters, though sixteen and of average size and intellect of his age, had retained all of his youthful enthusiasm. Or, as Cartman often said, "He just never stopped being a pansy-ass, did he?"

And then Stan was gone, the door shutting behind him as he left. Kenny sighed.

"So you get it now?" Kyle prompted him.

"Mm-hmm," said Kenny vaguely. At least, he understood that if he was ever going to pass any of his classes this quarter, he needed to stop thinking about Stan. He was just acting stupid. It's not like he was . . .

Kenny's eyes widened. Was he gay?

He shook his head. No--he had too much to deal with right now. Shoving the thought aside, he attempted to immerse himself into the physics worksheet, effectively reading through the first problem and making absolutely no sense of it before drifting off . . . and thinking, of all things, about Stan Marsh.

* * *

Kenny thought he must be so hungry that his stomach had virtually shut itself down in an attempt to spare him the agony of yearning for real food. For the past few days he had been nursing a baguette he'd found in the trash behind the supermarket, but he wouldn't dare take out what was left of it during school. It wasn't normal for a sixteen-year-old boy to carry a half-eaten, crusting baguette in his bookbag.

Mole sat beside him. "You're in my zeat."

Frowning, Kenny looked around to see where he'd sat. Sure enough it was the table where Mole sat alone, talking into his walkie-talkie or cell phone in code about whatever covert missions he had taken on in a given week. "So you want me to move?" Kenny asked.

"_Non_, forget eet." Mole sat down grudgingly beside him. Kenny could smell cigarrette smoke wafting off of him. "Do whatever zeh hell you want."

Kenny raised an eyebrow at him. Mole's tone was more cynical and harsh than usual, which said something, coming from the mercenary who hated God and pretty much anyone on the planet.

But Mole ate in silence for a little while before saying, "Your coat ees absurd. What possesses you to wear zat rag everyday? Do you 'ave zome 'ideous deformity underneath eet?"

"No," said Kenny defensively, starting to stand up.

"Don't be a wuss. Zeat back down. I'm only mean to zay that I zought you would 'ave outgrown zat orange fluffball by now."

"Apparently not," Kenny said in an abrupt voice.

Mole shrugged. "Your life, I zuppose."

"Exactly." Kenny couldn't stand to sit next to Mole's tray of food another second longer. He was so hungry it was nauseating to be near the smell. "I have to . . . work on a history essay." Not so much a lie, but a weak excuse, nonetheless.

"Sure. Come back when you feel like telling me zeh truth about zat coat fetish of yours."

Kenny ignored him on his way out of the schoolgrounds.

* * *


	3. Chapter Three

Chapter Three

_"Children," his father fumed angrily, "do _not_ just come back to life after they are killed." _

_"I'm telling you, that's what happened, Stuart."_

_"Bullshit. Either you lied to me about him gettin' shot, or that's the devil's child, that is." _

_Kenny closed his eyes, clutching to his orange coat. It was too warm to wear it and the house was absolutely steaming. He wished Kevin was home so they could play checkers together, but it was just him and his parents, and his dad was drunk again. _

_"Stuart . . . " Kenny winced, hearing his mother try to reason. This was all his fault. _

_"Tell me the truth! What really happened?" _

_"I told you the--" _

Liar!_" A slap sounded through the kitchen and Kenny's mom gasped. _

_"Stop it," Kenny screamed, jumping up from the coach and facing his father. "Stop being mean, it wasn't her fault." _

_"You," his father roared. Kenny took a step back. He had never seen his father this angry before. "You honestly believe this bitch when she says you died and came back to life? Tell me, kid, were you really shot in the head?" _

_Kenny nodded slowly. "But I'm okay now." _

_"What the fuck is this? Are you both out of your minds?" He groped for his vodka bottle, found it and took a deep swig. "You don't come back from the dead unless you're a child of the devil. Are you saying that a child of the devil was raised in my house, Carol?" _

_"N-no--" his mother stammered. _

_"Then explain this, damn it!" _

_"Dad, quit it--"_

_Kenny honestly didn't believe that his father meant to do it, but somehow or another the vodka bottle flew out of the man's hand and smashed in his face. Kenny shrieked, the agony erupting near instantaneously. Eyes blinded by red blood, he stumbled up to the room he and Kevin shared, slammed the door and sobbed as he continued to hear the ruckus down the hall. _

* * *

Frustrated with Mole during lunch, Kenny walked outside, safe from the smell of all the food. It was icy out again, the temperature having dropped from earlier that morning. He shivered.

"Heya, Kenny."

"Butters," Kenny greeted him, nodding.

It didn't take a genius to see Butters was feeling down, especially since his emotions were written all over his face. Typical that someone would come to Kenny to yabber about their lives. Kenny figured he was the only boy in the school who wouldn't mercilessly mock someone for having emotions--that is, except Stan.

Kenny quickly shook his friend's image out of his mind. Resigned, he asked, "What's the matter, Butters?"

Butters sat down on one of the dilapidated swings from the playground in the back of the high school. "I don't know."

Knowing Butters well enough to figure he wasn't finished, Kenny sat in the swing beside him and waited. He was glad Butters could not see his face from under his hood or he would know how incredibly impatient Kenny was for him to just spit it out already.

"It's just . . ." Butters gulped. "Kenny, I like this girl a lot and I don't know what to do because she probably doesn't know I _exist_ so what should I do before I lose my mind?" he finally blurted out, his words jumbling on top of each other in his nervous rush.

Why the hell did people think Kenny knew anything about relationships?! When he was eight years old he'd had a girlfriend for a grand total of two days, and then he'd been flying solo ever since. He rolled his eyes.

"Who's the girl?" he asked.

"I can't tell you!"

A beat. Kenny waited.

Butters bit his lip, looking anxious. "All right, it's Wendy, but you _can't tell anyone_."

It took all of Kenny's self-control not to burst out laughing. "Wendy," he repeated. _The_ Wendy, who Stan had been stalking ever since Kenny could remember? The same Wendy who was only the most attractive girl in all of South Park and was constantly batting her eyelashes at Stan now that they were older? Please. It was clear that the pair of them were getting married, probably on the beach with the smell of the ocean salt in the background, like some postcard Kenny bought when he was six because it was ten cents and he'd found a dime on the ground.

Although he had to admit it would be terribly convenient if Butters and Wendy ended up together. Then Stan would be . . .

Kenny shook his head. God _damn_ it! What the hell was wrong with him, thinking that way? He was sick. No way in hell would he ruin Stan and Wendy's chances together over his petty jealousy. A jealousy that was wrong in the first place, that made no sense.

"Yeah," Butters answered defensively. Then he sniffled, looking absolutely miserable. "But she doesn't know."

_No shit_, Kenny thought to himself.

"What should I do?"

Kenny tried to think of an appropriate answer. How to help Butters without betraying Stan?

After a moment of deliberation, Kenny finally said, "Why don't you ask her about herself? Girls like that sort of thing."

Butters brightened. "You're right, Kenny! Wow! Thanks," he exclaimed, bouncing off the swing and running away.

* * *

It was one in the morning and Kenny was sitting on a gravesite, chewing his pencil vehemently and staring down at the three lines in his notebook.

_History affects me because without it we would not be who we are today. The people like the founding fathers helped to shape our nation, for example, and without that we would not be America. Then we would not have democracy. _

It was a complete and utter piece of shit, and Kenny knew it. He crumpled up the page and groaned out loud, falling back against the cool headstone.

He had been eleven years old when his dad had died. Shot in the head, his mother had told him. A terrible murder, completely unjustified and random, she had said. And for a moment, despite the fact that Kenny's mom had inexplicably thrown out all of the sheets to their bedspread, Kenny had believed her.

When he was twelve years old, though, he had found the suicide note Stuart McCormick had left behind, tucked into the creaking floorboard in his parents' room. Something along the lines of "_I just can't take it anymore, he's dead and then he's alive, I'm going fucking insane,_" but Kenny hadn't bothered to memorize it word for word. One reading was enough. He had never trusted his mother again . . . a month after that, of course, she had found her first boyfriend, so Kenny felt as justified at being mad at her as ever.

Except he wasn't really as angry with his mother as he was with himself. After all, he had driven his father insane. Whether or not he'd meant to die all of those times, at the end of the day, Kenny had caused the suicide. That note had been all the proof he'd needed.

Now he looked up at the simple, cheap little headstone, the name _Stuart McCormick _engraved in neat scrawl. He touched it with one of his exposed fingers that was bursting the seams from his too-small gloves.

He'd always heard that suicides went to hell. But not once had he ever seen his father down there.

* * *

"Kenny, where's my hair scrunchie?" Katie demanded of Kenny frantically on her way out the door the next morning.

"Hell if I know. You're gonna miss the bus if we don't leave in a second, though," Kenny warned his little sister, yawning.

Kevin, who woke up later than his siblings as he had friends who were nice enough to give him a ride every morning (not that it ever occurred to him to help his brother and sister out, too), walked into the kitchen sleepily. "What's for breakfast?" The older boy actually lived in an apartment he'd rented with some friends just off town, but he didn't miss the opportunity to mooch from food at home when he was running low with his "buds".

"There's some peanut butter," Kenny shrugged. He still had his baguette and would sooner jump off a cliff than share it with someone. He snickered to himself at the thought.

Down the hall he heard a door opening. "Let's go," Kenny said quickly, grabbing his sister's hand.

Jolted by the gesture, Katie frowned at him. "What's your problem?" she asked. "I can't go until I find my--"

"Just use a rubber band from school or something," Kenny snapped. Footsteps that belonged unmistakably to his mother's boyfriend were shuffling toward them. His heart started beating in his head.

"Kenny!" Katie began to protest.

Kenny rounded on her. "Shut _up_," he said harshly under his breath. The last thing he wanted was for Richard to know he'd been in the house overnight. Heaven forbid he sleep in his own room.

Before Katie could make another noise, Kenny bolted from the house, headed straight for the bus stop. His body was pulsing with fear. He was disgusted with himself; what did he care about a little pain every now and then? It's not like Richard could ever _really_ kill him.

But maybe that's what scared him more than anything. No matter how many times he was screamed at or kicked out of the house or beaten to a pulp, Kenny just couldn't stay dead.


End file.
